In 1919 Thomas Mann hailed Effi Briest (1895) as one of "the six most significant novels ever written." Set in Bismarck's Germany, Fontane's luminous tale of a socially suitable but emotionally disastrous match between the enchanting seventeen-year-old Effi and an austere, workaholic civil servant twice her age, is at once touching and unsettling. Fontane's taut, ironic narrative depicts a world where sexuality and the enjoyment of life are stifled by narrow-mindedness and circumstance. Considered by many to be the pinnacle of the nineteenth-century German novel, Effi Briest is a tale of adultery that ranks with Madame Bovary and Anna Karenina and brilliantly demonstrates the truth of the author's comment and "women's stories are generally far more interesting."

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About the Author:

Theodor Fontane was born in Neuruppin in 1819, the son of a Gascon Huguenot father and a Cevennoise mother, and was brought up on the Baltic Sea coast of Prussia. He did not write his first novel until the age of fifty-six and consequently was able to bring to his fiction a lifetime's experience from many spheres. He was a pharmaceutical dispenser, a war correspondent in the Austrian Campaign of 1866 and in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71, and secretary to the Prussian Royal Academy of Arts. Fontane was the author of two war books, four volumes of travels in Mark Brandenburg, a slim volume of ballads and another of impressions. Vor dem Sturm (1878) is held to be a masterpiece in the genre of the historical novel. A theme of 'the woman's predicament' runs through his novels L'Adultera (1882), Cecile (1886), Wirrungen (1888), Frau Jenny Treibel (1893) and Effi Briest (1895). Poggenpuhls was published in 1896. He died in 1898.

Book Description Penguin Books Ltd, United Kingdom, 2001. Paperback. Book Condition: New. Reissue. 190 x 128 mm. Language: English Brand New Book. Telling the tragic tale of a socially advantageous but emotionally ruinous match, Theodor Fontane s Effi Briest is translated from the German by Hugh Rorrison with an introduction by Helen Chambers in Penguin Classics . Unworldly young Effi Briest is married off to Baron von Innstetten, an austere and ambitious civil servant twice her age, who has little time for his new wife. Isolated and bored, Effi finds comfort and distraction in a brief liaison with Major Crampas, a married man with a dangerous reputation. But years later, when Effi has almost forgotten her affair, the secret returns to haunt her - with fatal consequences. In taut, ironic prose Fontane depicts a world where sexuality and the will to enjoy life are stifled by vain pretences of civilization, and the obligations of circumstance. Considered to be his greatest novel, this is a humane, unsentimental portrait of a young woman torn between her duties as a wife and mother and the instincts of her heart. Hugh Rorrison s clear, modern translation is accompanied by an introduction by Helen Chambers, which compares Effi with other literary heroines such as Emma Bovary and Anna Karenina. Theodor Fontane (1819-98) was a German novelist and potitical reporter. Along with Effi Briest , Fontane is remembered for Frau Jenny Treibel (1892), an ironic criticism of middle-class hypocrisy and small-mindedness. If you enjoyed Effi Briest you may like Leo Tolstoy s Anna Karenina , also available in Penguin Classics . I have been haunted by it.as I am by those novels that seem to do more than they say, to induce strong emotions that can t quite be accounted for . (Hermione Lee, Sunday Times ). Bookseller Inventory # APG9780140447668

Book Description Penguin Books Ltd, United Kingdom, 2001. Paperback. Book Condition: New. Reissue. 190 x 128 mm. Language: English Brand New Book. Telling the tragic tale of a socially advantageous but emotionally ruinous match, Theodor Fontane s Effi Briest is translated from the German by Hugh Rorrison with an introduction by Helen Chambers in Penguin Classics . Unworldly young Effi Briest is married off to Baron von Innstetten, an austere and ambitious civil servant twice her age, who has little time for his new wife. Isolated and bored, Effi finds comfort and distraction in a brief liaison with Major Crampas, a married man with a dangerous reputation. But years later, when Effi has almost forgotten her affair, the secret returns to haunt her - with fatal consequences. In taut, ironic prose Fontane depicts a world where sexuality and the will to enjoy life are stifled by vain pretences of civilization, and the obligations of circumstance. Considered to be his greatest novel, this is a humane, unsentimental portrait of a young woman torn between her duties as a wife and mother and the instincts of her heart. Hugh Rorrison s clear, modern translation is accompanied by an introduction by Helen Chambers, which compares Effi with other literary heroines such as Emma Bovary and Anna Karenina. Theodor Fontane (1819-98) was a German novelist and potitical reporter. Along with Effi Briest , Fontane is remembered for Frau Jenny Treibel (1892), an ironic criticism of middle-class hypocrisy and small-mindedness. If you enjoyed Effi Briest you may like Leo Tolstoy s Anna Karenina , also available in Penguin Classics . I have been haunted by it.as I am by those novels that seem to do more than they say, to induce strong emotions that can t quite be accounted for . (Hermione Lee, Sunday Times ). Bookseller Inventory # APG9780140447668

Book Description Penguin Classics. PAPERBACK. Book Condition: New. 0140447660 After marrying a Baron twice her age and moving to a remote Baltic port, Effi Briest begins an affair that threatens to ruin her marriage and her life. Bookseller Inventory # 4205076

Book Description Penguin Classics 2000-11-30, 2000. Book Condition: New. Brand new book, sourced directly from publisher. Dispatch time is 24-48 hours from our warehouse. Book will be sent in robust, secure packaging to ensure it reaches you securely. Bookseller Inventory # NU-BER-00024128